


Fractured Spin

by ImJaebabie



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Fluff, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, M/M, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, semi-canon-compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 10:09:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17139815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImJaebabie/pseuds/ImJaebabie
Summary: Having a broken bone sucks. Having high quality friends makes it better.





	Fractured Spin

**Author's Note:**

> i miss Donghyuck and im coping like this. also merry Christmas to anyone who celebrates, here’s some cuteness on me.

The ceiling fan turns in slow, agonizing rotation, it’s blades cutting through the chalky-warm air from the mini furnace, hanging otherwise static and thick near the off white paint above Donghyuck’s head.

Six hundred and twenty three, six hundred and twenty four, six hundred and twenty fi—

A sigh weighted with bone-deep boredom and the citrusy twinge of frustration pours out of him, its subsequent breath rising, he imagines, to join the slow churn up above.

He stops counting the turns of the fan blade, loses track of which one he’s been following. It’s just a pointless distraction that isn’t even working. No amount of white noise can fill the quiet of the dorm that’s absent of any other person—or well, any other of its normal resident members. Kun’s there somewhere, and Jaemin. Occasionally Donghyuck can hear a klink from the kitchen or a low whisper, the plasticine creak of the couch pleather as someone eases onto it. These are just ghost sounds to Donghyuck, ephemeral and lacking the echo of belonging. He appreciates their help, their kindness—he honestly doesn’t even deserve it, knows they’d rather be doing other things—but they’re like spectral support beams trying to fill corners that need brick and mortar; they can’t bear the weight.

Donghyuck knows, indisputably, that he’s being dramatic. He loves Jaemin, he’s happy the dorm isn’t completely empty. He was relieved to hear Kun’s voice. He just doesn’t want to be here.

He shifts on his bed, trying not to look at the empty blankets of Jaehyun’s side of the room—but he can’t escape the reminder. He can’t escape anything at all. He twists, and the boot on his leg drags against his duvet with as much tonnage as the anchor on a cruiseliner.

 _Fractured tibia._ He’s googled the words so many times at this point, dug so far into Web MD and wikipedia that he can rattle off thirteen different types of break, the process for a handful of potential surgeries, the healing time projected to recover from everything from a hairline to a snapped bone. His own x-rays still sit heavy inside his phone, the photo zoomed in on the insultingly thin line that’s keeping him bedridden, keeping him chained to the dorm right at this moment while his group walks the red carpet at yet another awards show.

It’s just so _irritating_. He’s not some weakling, dammit. Donghyuck is strong and capable, he’s not supposed to be vulnerable like this. He doesn’t dance for hours a day, every day, in between other schedules just so his leg can fucking betray him right before all their key end-of-year performances.

“Your legs show signs of being under a lot of stress, do you warm up properly?” the doctor had said, squinting at the x-ray again and prodding fingers into Donghyuck’s calf.

“We always warm up...almost always...well sometimes when we’re in a rush we—”

The doctor raised a disapproving eyebrow, interrupting. “Won’t be rushing much now, will you? Maybe keep that in mind, from now on. Sit here while I get the nurse to come fit you for a cast.”

Donghyuck worked very hard not to say something rude back to him.

Buried somewhere in his blankets, Donghyuck’s phone vibrates once, then again. It’s done similarly a handful of times over the past couple of hours, but he doesn’t want to look at it. He’s pretty sure he knows what it will be, and he just doesn’t have the stomach to see messages from the awards show, even if they’re meant to be sweet and include him. He doesn’t want to answer questions about how he’s feeling—the answer isn’t changing. He feels completely normal, except for the anchor. His leg doesn’t hurt unless he tries to walk, foolishly allows a hint of his weight to shift from his other foot. It’s more unbearable if he happens to get an itch below the paralyzed plaster and gauze, where he can’t wiggle a finger in far enough to relieve it. Yesterday he had one bad enough it made him cry...or maybe it was the frustration that did that. If anyone asks, it was the itch.

Yuta had joked, tried to joke, that he envied Donghyuck’s getting to sleep in and play games. The joke fell flat for a few reasons—Yuta doesn’t even really play video games, if anything he’d been even more frustrated by the temporary disability, but Donghyuck didn’t point it out—but mostly because none of them actually envied him being stuck doing nothing for...for...god. Who knows how long? The video games and endless napping got boring on day three. Donghyuck feels like a sled dog kept back from the Iditarod, full of useless pent-up energy and snapping at anyone who comes too close. He doesn’t even have the motivation to be funny, just bitter.

Donghyuck pulls himself into a seated position on his bed with an effort so lethargic it feels like years have passed before he’s vertical enough to stare down at his cast. It’s littered with doodles, notes and signatures. Johnny’s giant, flashy name takes up a solid few inches, surrounded with hearts, and encapsulating half the Dreamie’s names as they graffitied over the gaps in his letters. There’s a Moomin drawn by Renjun, its chunky, tiny leg also booted, and a sour expression on its normally cute face.

“That’s you,” Renjun had noted, pointing his marker at the doodle.

“I get it,” said Hyuck, hoping that sounded more amused than annoyed.

He rubs a thumb over the character, almost disappointed it doesn’t smudge. Names and well-wishes pass under his fingers as Donghyuck reviews them for the millionth time, until some swooshy wiggles and an exaggerated star make him pause. As signatures go, it’s a little bit of a cop-out, a cheat at writing an actual name.

But Donghyuck’s always loved Mark’s signature, and he can’t pretend otherwise.

His forefinger traces over the little capital M, the five pointed star corners, and jabs at the tiny frowny-face drawn below it.

“Eloquent…” he mutters, a lifeless complaint.

There’s a gentle rap at his door, and Donghyuck moves his hand away, re-angles himself to lean against the wall with his booted leg outstretched and the other bent up against his chest.

“Hyuckie...you awake?” Jaemin’s voice questions gently, his tone low. Part of Donghyuck wants to deny it, but he’s already bored out of his mind, has been since the others left early that afternoon, and being petulant won’t improve that.

He nods, forgetting that action isn’t audible, then winces at the tiny crack in his voice as he replies, “Yeah.”

Jaemin eases the door open and Hyuck briefly wonders why so god-awfully slow, until he sees the bowl of jjigae in his hands, carefully balanced and steaming. He smiles one of his patented Jaemin smiles and brings it to the tiny table next to Donghyuck’s bed.

“Kun’s recipe of course, but I helped,” he says, answering a question Donghyuck didn’t ask.

“You guys know I’m not sick, right? Just. Temporarily, uh...handicapped.”

Jaemin nods, wringing his bowl-hot fingers out before lifting himself onto the bed beside Hyuck and settling in against the wall. Donghyuck feels a pinprick of annoyance that the other boy simply assumed he could stay, but it disappears as the warmth from Jaemin’s shoulder bleeds into his own, the presence of another person suddenly grounding and reassuring. Like he can feel his consciousness sink back down from its place by the ceiling fan and settle inside his own body again. Jaemin lightly bounces his legs against the mattress for a moment, then glances at Donghyuck’s still and immobile legs and stops.

“...you should eat,” says Jaemin, like an afterthought, although he hasn’t shared the preceding one aloud.

He doesn’t feel hungry, but he probably should. Donghyuck holds his hands out, silently asking for the bowl, and Jaemin stretches to lift it again and pass it carefully over their laps.

He twists his lips as Donghyuck blows the steam off a spoonful and dips it into his mouth. “Kun hyung’s gonna be pissed you’re eating over your bed.”

“Hyung can be pissed then. It’s not like I can hop up and run to the dinner table. Isn’t that why you brought it in here anyway?” An appealing slice of meat slips off the spoon and Donghyuck chases after it, keeping his eyes on the food rather than his friend.

“Sort of, also I just wanted to see—“ Jaemin pauses as Donghyuck’s eyes flick swiftly up to his, spoon hovering in front of his lips.

“Please don’t.”

Jaemin frowns, mouth closing around the words Donghyuck just knows, just is sure were going to be: _—how you’re feeling._

He lets the spoon slide back into the bowl and rests the meal in his lap, sighing. “It doesn’t hurt, okay? If something happens and it does, they gave me meds. I’m _fine._ I just wish everyone would stop asking.”

“It’s only ‘cause we care about you, Hyuckie,” replies Jaemin. He fiddles with the hem of his shirt, but keeps his eyes fixed on Donghyuck’s face. The fan continues to spin, wafting the scent of bean paste and capsaicin around the room, stirring up the flavor along with the tension Donghyuck has created simply by being there and being so frustrated by everything.

Dipping a finger into the hot liquid and prodding at a piece of green onion, Donghyuck drops his chin in a single nod. “Well I know. I just don’t want to be treated like an invalid. It makes it feel like this is permanent.”

“Ah,” says Jaemin, his expression shifting to something unreadable.

“What I _feel_ is frustrated,” continues Donghyuck, watching the liquid in the bowl swirl like the fan overhead. “I should have been able to prevent this, or avoid it, but I didn’t and suddenly my bone just...gives up on me? Like, top ten worst anime betrayals. What a joke. I shouldn’t have to be stuck in here like this but I am and when everyone looks at me with those… stupid, sympathetic eyes I just wanna scream. I hate it. And I’m bored. I’m fucking tired of this, and it’s only just started. But everyone just asks _how I’m feeling._ So _that’s_ how I feel. It’s like no one gets it.”

The room grows silent and he realizes just how heated his voice had become. Donghyuck’s tongue feels strange, like the mini tirade he’s just finished coated it with anger in the form of a bland film. He takes a spoonful of soup, hoping the spice will remove it. It helps only a little.

After another beat he realizes the silence has stretched too long, and turns his eyes toward Jaemin. The other boy is staring at his hands, neatly folded in his lap, with just the barest little curve of a smile on his lips, something almost like amusement.

“That does sound annoying,” he comments, voice oddly wry, “maybe you should tell them that.” Jaemin scoots forward until his socked feet touch on the floor, then pushes himself standing. Donghyuck watches him, and feels confused for a reason he can’t pinpoint.

A long breath leaves Jaemin, out through his nose as he turns a knowing grin on Donghyuck while reaching for the door. “Maybe if you explained that, someone else might know the feeling.”

Jaemin turns away in a parallel motion with the doorknob, half-moved out of the room while Donghyuck’s brow furrows in confusion, his eyes trained on the wide plane of his friend’s back as the door takes it soon out of sight and— _oh._

_Oh._

“J-Jaemin! Nana, wait!”

Donghyuck calls out, louder than necessary in the quiet dorm, and struggles to set the bowl aside so he can follow. Broth spills a bit from the lip into his blanket, ugly brown seeping into the white, and Donghyuck piles another small regret on top of the large one he’s just created a moment earlier. He manages to get the bowl on the side table and almost shuffle onto his good foot, angling forward and wobbling dangerously before there’s the green of Jaemin’s sweater in front of his eyes and careful arms wrapping to support him.

“Don’t get up, you might hurt yourself,” Jaemin warns, voice so warm and so understanding.

Donghyuck is a fool.

 _“I’m sorry,”_ he croaks out, burying his face in Jaemin’s shoulder as they ease back onto the bed, the other boy careful not to jostle Donghyuck’s cast as he sits by his side once again.

“I’m sorry, Nana,” Donghyuck repeats, “that was really stupid, I’m such a fuckin idiot, god _I’m sorry—“_

 

And Jaemin laughs, sweetly, because he’s the best kind of person. “It’s okay,” he forgives easily, “I knew you didn’t mean to—...I knew you didn’t realize. I forget too, sometimes, now that I’m here again.”

Donghyuck pulls back so that he can see his friend’s eyes, full of compassion he’d missed and dismissed before. “How did you ever deal with this?” he asks, tone meek.

“You mean after being angry all the time, and crying constantly, and arguing with everyone in sight for the first two or three months?” Donghyuck’s face falls as Jaemin speaks, but Jaemin just brings a hand up and pets the hair around his ear soothingly, reassuring. “I just took it one day at a time, looked for small things to appreciate. I celebrated every tiny step towards getting better.”

“God you’re….so much better than me,” breathes Donghyuck.

Jaemin shakes his head. “No I’m not, I just had a long time to practice patience. But for the record...I _did_ hurt.”

“Jaemin,” Donghyck whines the word, deflating onto the other’s shoulder and simmering still with shame. He momentarily had wondered why Jeno or Renjun hadn’t volunteered to come babysit him, and chalked it up to Jaemin being the most mothering out of them. Of course there was more to it.

“Thanks for coming,” he whispers, settling into where the taller boy shifts to cradle Hyuck in his lanky arms. “I’m really glad you’re here.”

Jaemin hums. “Welcome.” There’s an implied, _I know how it feels to need someone._ Donghyuck counts ten fan rotations before Jaemin asks, “Do you wanna watch a movie?”

“Mm.”

“I’ll have to move and get the laptop, Hyuckie.”

“Then forget it.”

A low giggle spills out of Jaemin, the vibrations of it rumbling gently by Donghyuck’s ear. “Hold on,” he suggests, and wiggles his phone from a pocket not readily visible. He taps at it with practiced deftness while Donghyuck breathes in the calming scent of the detergent used in the Dreamies' dorm, something more floral and cottony than whatever it is he uses. Maybe sometime he’ll ask one of the hyungs to take his laundry there. Perhaps Mark would do it.

“There, give it a minute and we’ll have a movie right speedy.”

“You know you talk weird sometimes, right?”

Jaemin pulls at Donghyuck’s ear. “It’s part of my charm.”

Moments later the door creaks open and in walks Kun, a laptop tucked under his arm and two mugs of tea occupying his hands. He pauses and gives the cuddling younger boys an appraising look.

“What service!” comments Jaemin brightly.

“So this is why you couldn’t come get it yourself? Lazy-ass kids…”

“But Duckie is hurt, hyung, remember?”

Kun scoffs. “Yes, but you aren’t.”

Lifting his head from Jaemin’s chest, Donghyuck points a finger at his cuddle buddy and says, “Sir, that’s my emotional support best friend.”

“Right,” Jaemin affirms, “it’s critical that I don’t leave him in this very trying time of need.”

The mugs of tea replace the barely-touched bowl of soup, which Kun eyes with something like disappointment as he hands the laptop to Jaemin. “Was it not good?” he asks, studying the bowl like he’ll be able to see what it lacks if he just looks hard enough.

Sitting a little straighter, Donghyuck shakes his head emphatically. “No hyung,” he urges, “it’s great I just...I’m not that hungry…thank you. For making it.”

That seems to reassure the older boy, who warms into a broad smile, dimpled and crescent-eyed. “You’re welcome. Cool. Have fun with your movie...Jaeminie, just let me know when you’re ready to head back.”

“‘Kay, thanks mama.”

Kun groans, but leaves without further comment.

“We’ve worn him down,” Jaemin explains as he adjusts the laptop for them both to be able to see, and Donghyuck giggles. “D’you wanna watch that Valerian movie? You haven’t seen it right?”

“Nope.”

“Okay great, because it’s a fucking wreck. Absolutely worthless. Guess what though.” Jaemin brings the screen to life and navigates to the chosen film as he talks, reaching awkwardly around Donghyuck to do so. Donghyuck already feels a tickle of drowsiness, wonders how much he’ll even manage to stay awake for, but hums his interest.

Jaemin wiggles a little, getting comfortable against Hyuck’s pillows while the other uses him as one. “The best part of the movie is this captain...has like, six lines maybe. And it’s Kris.”

Donghyuck barks out a laugh, unexpecting. “Wu?”

“The very same.”

“Phenomenal. I’m sold.”

There’s no lie in Jaemin’s account of the film, and what he’s awake for Donghyuck finds to be terrible but hilarious. But it’s warm against Jaemin, and the consistent whir of the fan creates a hypnotic background noise to the movie, and Donghyuck has no idea where the movie is when he stops dozing and falls asleep for real.

When he wakes again, there are voices filtering in varying levels of hushed tone throughout the dorm, and Jaemin is gone, the light still on and Donghyuck’s pillow cuddled in his arms as replacement. He rubs his eyes and digs into the blankets for his phone, ignoring the missed messages to look at the time. _12:48am_ blinks back.

The hush of voices grows closer, hovering just on the other side of the door.

“You can stop whispering, I’m awake,” Donghyuck calls, just enough volume to get past the partition. The voices pause, and the door opens.

“What are you doing up? You should be asleep, that’s how you heal,” scolds Taeyong, following an agreeing Jaehyun inside. His roommate pulls off his jacket and shuffles around the room while Taeyong observes Donghyuck, like he’s inspecting a car for dents, checking that his condition has at least maintained.

Donghyuck huffs but grins too. “I was asleep until some people came barging into the house like a herd of elephants. Someone needs to tell Taeil hyung to learn to step lighter.”

“Hey!” Taeyong tuts, but giggles anyway.

On the other side of the room, Jaehyun chuckles as he gathers a change of clothes. He comes to stand by Taeyong and reach past him, ruffling Donghyuck’s hair and then flicking his ear. “Punk. I’m gonna shower, then it’s lights out in here. I’m tired.”

As he disappears Taeyong says a quick goodnight, slipping out behind the other while Donghyuck rubs his stinging appendage. At least, he thinks, Jaehyun doesn’t smother him with all kinds of pity.

He’s just starting to drift off again when the creak he’s becoming intimately familiar with sounds again behind him. Donghyuck ignores the sound, continuing to face the wall as he’s sure there’s nothing he and Jaehyun really need to talk about at this hour.

A hand nudges his shoulder a moment later.

“Donghyuck?”

The hesitant whisper sets a bloom of warmth growing in his chest. He turns, blinking up, and finds Mark’s concerned eyes, still framed in sparkling makeup he hasn’t taken the time to remove yet.

“Hey.”

A corner of a grin slips on Mark’s lips. “Hey, how’re you—“ he pauses, maybe at the minute change in Donghyuck’s expression, “...hey.”

“I’m feeling...good, hyung. A bit bored.”

Relief floods Mark’s features, concern melting away from his brown puppy eyes and cheeks lifting. “Oh, that’s good.”

Sliding his elbows back, Donghyuck wrangles himself more upright, an awkward movement he’s getting more and more used to. He pats the bed, indicating Mark to sit.

“What’s up? How was...KPMA?”

Mark confirms with a nod, sitting gingerly beside Donghyuck like any amount of jostling might break him further. As he sits is when Donghyuck notices the hand he’s been keeping behind his back, catches the glint of some item and a corner of gold paper.

“What’s that?” asks Donghyuck before Mark has time to answer his first question.

Mark chuckles, drawing a boxy little award out where the other can see it clearly. “We won a bonsang,” he reveals, handing the chunky thing to Donghyuck. “Taeyong hyung said it was for you in his speech. I thought you should see it.”

Donghyuck turns the award over in his hands, reading the shining Hangul that spells out their name and achievement. He bites down on his lip, breathing in slowly to keep the threat of tears from rising. It’s not even that big of a deal, but Donghyuck seems to just be emotionally compromised on this day in particular.

“Thanks, Mark hyung,” he whispers, hoping his smile communicates how grateful he really is. It must be, since a dusting of pink appears on Mark’s cheeks.

Gold catches in Donghyuck’s peripheral and he stares at what appears to be a napkin still in Mark’s hand. The older follows the gaze, and makes a small sound. “Ah right, this is for you too.” He hands the napkin to Donghyuck. “From the dessert table, they had the little pastries you like, with the cream inside?”

At that, Donghyuck opens the napkin with more haste, emitting a pleased little squeak. The couple of small, delicate treats are somewhat squished, like they’ve seen the inside of a pocket recently, but otherwise unharmed. He pops one into his mouth and hums around the sweet taste. The flavor is smooth and milky, and infrequent enough that Donghyuck twists himself immediately to hug around Mark’s waist and squeeze.

“Thank you-u,” he drags the word out, keeping his grip even though Mark wriggles in his hold.

“Okay, okay, you’re welcome, let me go,” he protests, quickly turning the hug into a scuffle that ends abruptly when Donghyuck knocks his enclosed heel back against the wall and grunts at the short shock of pain in his calf.

Mark stills instantly, hands holding Donghyuck at a safe distance by the shoulders, and his frown returns in full force. “Shit, you okay??”

The pang fades quickly, really not very close to his fracture at all, but Donghyuck bends away and brings a hand down to brush over the cast anyway. He glances between it and Mark’s raincloud expression, and can't quite stifle a laugh.

“What?”

“You look just like this, hyung,” Donghyuck says, and points to the tiny frown face the older had drawn by his name.

“Oh.”

Donghyuck sighs airily. “Everyone else wrote me at least a _‘get well soon,’_ but all I got from you was this.” He doesn’t really know why he wants to complain about it. It’s no big deal. But teasing Mark has always come on instinct to him, and he’s never declined the inclination yet.

The crease of Mark’s frown only deepens. He turns, scanning the room until he finds the marker that is sitting on Donghyuck’s side table behind two half-empty mugs of tea, and plucks it up.

Raising an interested eyebrow, Donghyuck wraps both hands around his cast and lifts his leg into Mark’s lap wordlessly, making the bandage accessible. For a few moments Mark is silent, holding the uncapped marker and working his jaw as he stares at the gap of blank space on the cast, assumedly thinking of what to write.

Finally he sets the tip and writes a few words, a line that Donghyuck turns his head mostly sideways to read.

_I’m sorry you got hurt._

“It’s not like you did it. Don’t be sorry, hyung, it just happened,” he responds aloud, but Mark seems not to be finished and writes again.

_It’s boring without you._

Donghyuck huffs, feeling his face warm a little. “Thanks, but there’s eight more there besides me, it’s not like Jungwoo can’t entertain you.”

Mark rolls his eyes, still using his sharpie to speak rather than his mouth.

_We miss our full sun._

A little bubble of pleased affection floats up Donghyuck’s lung and pops somewhere near his heart, fizzing. He fights a smile, but he knows Mark catches it anyway. The marker lowers to his cast again, Mark’s hand hesitating just for a second before the felt scratches against hardened medical gauze...

_I miss you the most._

A flood of bubbles fizz and pop in the vicinity of Donghyuck’s aorta and he snatches the marker from Mark’s fingers, capping it and keeping it captive in his fist before bringing a pillow over and burying his flushed face into it, squeezing tight by his cheeks.

“Alright, alright, I get it,” he whines into the fluff and cotton, not caring if Mark can understand his muffled voice or not.

Mark pokes a finger into his side, and Donghyuck contracts into a protective hunch, pulls his face free and gasps a breath of un-pillow-filtered air.

“I just wanted to make sure you knew,’” says Mark, lopsided grin staring down at him.

Donghyuck rolls his eyes. “Well I know, so stop being so sappy. You’ll put John Green out of business and then where will we get our lame teenage romantic comedies?”

It’s a throw-away question, rhetorical and meant to be a joke, but it’s Mark he’s talking to, and beautiful, genuine, honest Mark sometimes takes things too seriously, sometimes chews the words behind his pretty round eyes and sends back a response where none was asked for.

“Guess we’ll have to come up with some of our own,” he posits, marker-empty fingers pulling at the loose threads of Donghyuck’s cast where it ends below his knee. They skirt near the rough skin there, brushing it occasionally with tickles fainter than feathers, and sending little fairy-shock shivers goosebumping across the rest of him. Donghyuck fights the urge to outright shudder, and dares to draw his eyes from his group mate’s hand to his face.

“W-we will?”

“Well, maybe, if we can think of any good plots,” Mark replies with a lilt in his voice.

Donghyuck chews his cheek, considering how far to push his luck before just tossing it over the edge and diving after it.

“Hmm, how about,” he suggests, dropping his voice down a notch, “ _when tragic injury befalls a young, totally cute idol—average viewer rating 37.5%—he is forced to become dependent on his ragtag members and their constant fussing—_ because he’s adorable, you know, so they can’t resist.” Donghyuck adds, widening his eyes and blinking sweetly.

Mark giggles, scrunching his nose. “Yeah? And then what?”

“Some shenanigans, obviously. Um….and then...well like, ‘cause it’s a rom-com...so I guess somewhere in his recovery, naturally he discovers feelings for...well, someone.” Somehow he’s stumbled past the point where this joke is comfortable, and Donghyuck is suddenly hyper conscious of his legs crossing Mark’s lap, of Mark’s hands resting at the top of his shin just below his knee cap where his shorts certainly don’t reach.

Mark chews a bit on his bottom lip, tugging at the loose thread that pulls gradually away from the rest of the cast.

“Who?” he asks, quiet and sincere, and Donghyuck thinks maybe it’s himself who’s unraveling rather than the slowly untethering gauze.

“Just. Someone.” Donghyuck can feel his voice getting quieter, but looking at Mark, he can’t stop speaking. The gaze in his dark eyes is more mesmerizing than the hypnotic, ever-turning blades sending gentle waves fanning from above. “Probably close to him, probably really considerate and thoughtful...like, brings him little gifts without being asked and y’know, really careful of his injury, who makes it feel weightless…someone like that.”

The older boy tilts his head ever so slightly. “And the climax of the movie? What happens?”

Maybe Donghyuck is imagining it, but he feels like the already limited space between them has suddenly decreased. Firm, lightly calloused hands grip his knees, warming them, and he thinks he can count every one of Mark’s long, delicate eyelashes.

“I mean...should be the same as every other ro...romantic comedy…he’ll have a breakthrough in his recovery, thanks to a friend maybe, and the lo-...the lo-...”

“The love interest?”

“Yes,” Donghyuck breathes, having struggled with the words, “he’ll be there, at the end of the day, telling the main character how much he missed him, holding him close…and they’ll...y’know.”

“What?”

He’s staring at Mark’s lips and he knows it.

“Well. Kiss.”

“Right,” whispers Mark. Donghyuck’s vision is filled with him as he speaks; the firm cut of his jaw, the tint-pink of his lips still wearing the vestiges of his stage makeup. Donghyuck doesn’t hear the fan, and he doesn’t feel his cast. There’s only stuttering breath and barely whispered words far too close to his mouth. “Kiss…”

It doesn’t make sense that Donghyuck’s kissing Mark a second later, that there’s a thumb tucked under his chin to hold his head steady while lips press innocently against his own. Mere hours earlier he’d enjoyed Jaemin’s platonic cuddling, found comfort in it, but it was a far cry from the way he’s somehow folded up between Mark and the wall now, legs bent to accommodate the older’s lean into him. It’s a slow kiss, hardly moving, allowing Donghyuck precious seconds to breathe in the scents of hair product, ironing starch, and subtle aftershave—the one Sicheng hyung gave Mark for his birthday, he thinks—that currently make up Mark. Familiar scents that have Donghyuck gently sighing and his rom-com love interest momentarily capturing his full bottom lip before pulling away.

“Sort of...s-sort of like that?” asks Mark, voice disembodied as Donghyuck keeps his eyes closed a few heartbeats longer.

He nods. “Yeah, like that.” When he opens his eyes, Mark is smiling and a summertime red fills his cheeks.

“I wonder if, in the movie, he tastes like vanilla cream too.”

It’s Donghyuck’s turn to blush, then, and he’s just thinking he’d like the fan to turn a bit faster and cool him down when there’s a audible cough from just outside the door. Mark moves back to the edge of the bed immediately, slowing only to carefully lift Donghyuck’s legs from his lap. He takes the other pastry and the award and sets them on the side table before standing and sticking a hand into his spray-stiff hair. Mark laughs, slightly awkward, while Donghyuck can only stare up at him with fingers held against his lip. Even still, he can’t hold the kiss there under them, but he tries.

Mark reaches for the door. “Good night, Hyuckie,” he says, pulling it open half, “I’m glad you’re feeling alright.” Jaehyun slips into the room, passing behind him, and Mark dips his head in a small, apologetic bow as he leaves. “Sorry hyung, night.”

Jaehyun makes a noncommittal sound in response, it barely registering with Donghyuck as he turns himself to lie down facing the wall and hears the door click shut. A second later, the lights flicker off as Jaehyun flips the switch, faint creaking as he climbs into bed.

“Maybe I’ll break my leg too,” the older boy comments casually, “see who brings me treats and randomly kisses me.”

Embarrassment pangs through Donghyuck and he whines, “Hyung, _please_ ,” but Jaehyun chuckles.

“Night, brat. Rest up and heal up, ‘kay?”

“Mm.”

The room hears no more words after that, and it isn’t long before Jaehyun’s breathing slows and steadies into the repetitive pattern of his faint snoring, blending into the fan’s continuous reliable hum.

Donghyuck takes much longer to sleep. Rather than the long, monotonous stretch of recovery time that filled him with bitterness as it rolled out ahead of him, he’s focused now on the possibilities; on little progresses for every upcoming day, and on mini movies that culminate in sugar-sweet kisses. He’s aware now that, even when he has to stay still for a while, the world continues to turn much like his ceiling fan, stirring up the air in his life and bringing surprises with it. Donghyuck drifts asleep, looking forward to counting every rotation.

**Author's Note:**

> now back to working on J&H lol just wanted to get this out there for my favorite boy Hyuck. lov y’all happy holidays bye.  
> (appreciate all comments/kudos/cc asks! same username there. :))) )


End file.
